The following are believed to reflect the state of the art:
US 2005/0259820 of Jones;
US 2004/0032967 of Kim et al.;
U.S. Pat. No. 6,539,475 to Cox et al.; and
PAJ 2004-242162 of Mitsubishi Electric Corp.
The following standards are also believed to be particularly relevant to the present specification and claims:
The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Standard, Advanced Video Coding for Generic Audiovisual Services, ITU-T Rec. H.264 (03/2005), also referred to as either H.264, or alternatively MPEG-4, especially the introduction (section 0), section 3, section 7.4.1; annex D, section D.1.4 and D.2.4; and annex D, section D.1.5 and D.2.5. The aforementioned sections cited of H.264 are hereby incorporated by reference.
ISO/IEC Standard, Information Technology—Generic Coding of Moving Pictures and Associated Audio Information: Systems, ISO/IEC 13818-1 (Jan. 15, 2000), also referred to as MPEG-2 Video Specification, especially the Introduction and section 2.1. The aforementioned sections cited of the MPEG-2 systems specification are hereby incorporated by reference. ISO/IEC Standard, Information Technology—Generic Coding of Moving Pictures and Associated Audio Information Video, ISO/IEC 13818-2 (Dec. 15, 2000), also referred to as MPEG-2 Video Specification, especially sections 6.2.2.2.2 and 6.3.4.1. The aforementioned sections cited of the MPEG-2 video specification are hereby incorporated by reference.
SMPTE Technology Committee C24 on Video Compression Technology Proposed SMPTE Standard for Television: VC-I Compressed Video Bitstream Format and Decoding Process, SMPTE 421m (Aug. 23, 2005), also known as VC-I, especially Annex F and Annex G, section G.7. The aforementioned sections cited of VC-I are hereby incorporated by reference.